


The Unwritten Rule

by elasticheartdowntown



Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-22
Updated: 2017-03-22
Packaged: 2018-10-09 07:15:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10406760
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elasticheartdowntown/pseuds/elasticheartdowntown
Summary: My first ever Brotzly fic. It's set quite a bit into the future at some point when they're very much in the swing of the Holistic Detecting and Assisting thing. It's my own exploration into their connection (including my own theories about said connection) and how it works within their roles in the Agency and the universe.





	

It could never be about them. That was one of the rules - albeit 'unwritten' rules - on the Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency code of conduct.

"It doesn't work that way, Todd. It never has. If we give in to our own self interests whilst working a case, it's just going to make things worse. Believe me…"

In a weird way, Todd could get on board with that. Without straying too much into 'holier than thou prick' territory, and he didn't even know if 'karma' played a part within the ridiculously complex make up of their de facto employer, but he figured he'd spent the first part of his life being a selfish asshole so it would make sense to spend the rest of it...not that. It wasn't like he had any real choice in the matter, anyway, being an assistant to a 'leaf on the stream of creation' and all - but he never let himself think about that for too long. He hated the thought of not being in control. But he was, and wasn't.

 _Just because you know you're playing a game doesn't mean you can't_ choose your moves.

He'd like to think he was more in control of his destiny than Dirk was. He liked to think a lot of things that weren't true. It comforted him.

The 'no self interest' rule became more of a challenge as the years went by. His and Dirk's relationship had evolved into…something - not best friend something, but something more? Yeah, definitely more, but not something that was ever, or could ever be fully defined. Todd would try to, in his mind, but whenever he made an attempt to stick a label on it his brain would hurt too much (a sensation he was well used to in his line of work) and he'd give up pretty quickly. All he knew was that when they weren't working a case (which was rare, but it happened) they'd spend every night in bed together having the most mind blowing sex of their lives. But that wasn't even all of it. That would be easy to label - 'fuck buddies' or 'best friends who like to fuck occasionally' or 'just two dudes who like to marathon fuck in-between being thrown wall to wall in the chaos labyrinth that was their reality' - but it wasn't just that. At its height, even the word 'love' seemed not enough somehow, a thought that threatened to make Todd throw up in his mouth whenever it appeared. Their relationship, like the universe, was a mystery that was slowly being etched away at, the complex truth of it only being uncovered with time and shared experience.

In more sentimental moments Dirk would fancifully declare that meeting Todd had been a reward for him - a gift from the universe to say thanks for all the good he'd done, or maybe just to make up for the shit he'd been put through. Todd could sense Dirk didn't really believe the words as he said them, but he took it as the somewhat fumbling but no less grandiose compliment it was meant to be.

If nothing else, Todd thought that as he spent he majority of his life trying to solve the unsolvable, his personal life could remain undefined.

But when Dirk decided they were on a case, the rule applied. Hard and fast - Todd needed to remember that. It wasn't Dirk's rule - not one he'd willingly created, but it was a rule he'd learned the hard way. The universe didn't help them - it only guided them on a path to helping others. That's the truth Dirk chose to believe, anyway. So Todd followed the rule without question, like he followed all the other rules, unwritten or otherwise.

Like that time they were somewhere outside of Moscow in the super computer maze that seemed to have been dreamt up by a die hard fan of Cube (a thankfully not yet ticked off film Todd had on his 'classic horrors to scare Dirk with' list)

They'd just escaped from a shrinking ventilation shaft after picking up what they assumed was the fail safe switch they found only by following the ridiculously complicated 4D hologram map the 13 year old boy they were currently trying to rescue had given them a week before. Lev was his name. He'd hired Dirk and Todd because a self developing AI his Father created before he was even born wanted to steal his soul. He was currently in a coma, nobody having any idea why, apart from the two guys from Seattle who just happened to be experts in soul stealing and rogue machines. 

Dirk could sense the end of the case - could practically smell it. He had that assured 'I know what's going to happen' look in his eyes that only occurred a second before the resolution. It was Todd's favourite part. Dirk never looked hotter. It made Todd want to push him up against the wall and kiss the hell out of him. But thoughts like that weren't professional. Plus the walls were electrified. 

They'd both been provided with specially insulated, neon green suits. They glowed in the dark. Helpful, but in no way fashionable, a thought Dirk had shared in one last moment of joviality before they got stuck in. The walls of the AI looked just like the inner workings of a real computer, all covered with wires and buttons and symbols neither of them recognised.

Todd gripped the switch between his hands - a clunky, heavy block with metal prongs sticking out of it, like a giant ugly hairbrush head with a rusty pull handle embedded in its back. It had the film of an unknown substance covering it which made Todd glad to be wearing gloves. Dirk had insisted on Todd holding it for reasons beyond his usual assisting duties - a reason he couldn't place at the time.    
Lev had told both men how to avoid all the traps in excessive detail based on his Father's writings, the map he provided also an instruction manual. Both men had successfully avoided near certain death at every turn. So far so good. 

But the problem with a self developing AI was its ability to make new traps to counter a specific threat, even if it did take time. This computer might have been labelled 'super,' but when compared to the other inventions they'd faced it seemed a bit rudimentary. No less deadly, though. Just slower. 

Nevertheless, when they'd made it to the room with the fail safe socket, they hadn't expected the wall to their left to flip suddenly, the newly revealed surface one they hadn't seen before - pure black with an almost liquid consistency to it. Dirk was about to get real familiar with said surface, as he was quickly dragged across the room towards it with a flailing cry before Todd could so much as blink. He stuck to the black mass like a bug on fly paper. The wall then flipped again, rotating Dirk out of sight. 

They really should have seen that coming. It wasn't like they weren't used to surprises. 

"Dirk! Are you ok?! Can you hear me?!" Todd shouted into the now deafening silence, the constant hum of the hardware sitting firmly in his subconscious. 

There was no reply, Dirk's yelling stopping instantly as he vanished from view. Todd didn't understand why the watery black wall thing only attracted Dirk. Maybe it was some weird magnet which only attracted men over a certain height. Or maybe it was just a normal magnet and Dirk had some kind've Wolverine like bone structure he hadn't thought to tell Todd about. 

The real truth of it was the computer had managed to obtain one of Dirk's hairs early on, able to use it to create a DNA based organic matter attracting super magnet. Ideally it'd have liked both sets of DNA so it could eradicate the two offending meat sacks in one fell swoop - but it didn't, so it had to compromise at this last juncture. Neither Todd or Dirk had a tiny hope of figuring this out for themselves.

A screen Todd didn't even realise was embedded into the opposite wall flashed into life. A battered black keyboard moved out from a slot underneath it with a clicking buzz. 

A phrase in Russian appeared on the screen in thick, glitching white. Todd squinted at it before hesitantly making his way towards the keyboard. 

He clenched his jaw, wedged the switch under his arm and typed: "I can't read Russian, motherfucker." He pressed enter before slipping the cargo back into his two handed grasp. 

For a while, nothing happened, and Todd stood alone in the low buzz, looking at the screen and gripping the switch tight. Trying not to freak out. That part never seemed to get any easier.

The screen flashed, and the words broke into segments before spinning up and down like panels on a fruit machine. Words Todd could actually recognise clicked into view.

"THE BOY FOR THE SWITCH" 

Dirk looked young for his age, sure, but he was hardly a boy. Neither was Todd - and Todd was smart enough to know that this AI was only pulling out the big guns because it could sense its end. 

Todd's phone bleeped in his pocket. An alarm telling him that the system glitch that only occurred every 6 years , 8 months and 12 days was about to take effect. It gave him a minute count down, and then he'd only have a 5 second window to plug in the switch and flip it. 1 minute 5 seconds to decide: Dirk's life, or Lev's. Todd didn't need his phone as the AI had helpfully provided a countdown for him. Except it had only given Todd 30 seconds to decide. Hardly fair. 

But the decision had already been made, even if Todd's throat iced over with fear and the long held vision of a life without Dirk pooled out in front of him, a dried up river in a desert wasteland. 

_"...it's just going to make things worse. Believe me..."_

It was never about them. It was always about the case - it was about saving who needed to be saved. That was what Todd had - unwittingly - signed up for. He was a co-agent of the galaxy - a guy who helped holistically solve 'cases' that couldn't be comprehended by the average, unbelieving joe.

\- and if that meant risking the life of the man who'd given his own life that very purpose, the man who he had intentionally undefined but no less powerful, all consuming feelings for, then that's what he had to do. Just as he'd risk his own life.

Both acts were one in the same.

That wasn't a thought that made Todd want to vomit. It was just a fact. It was one of the few things he understood. Not so much sentiment, but truth. The seed of that realisation was planted right from the first case, where their happiness and distress seemed paralleled at pivotal moments. If one man became injured, the other would also become incapacitated in a way that was the same, similar or entirely different, depending on the situation. It made any notion of one man rescuing the other near impossible, and made the necessity to stick together all the more pressing. 

By the same token, if one man succeeded in something, the other would be right there, also succeeding - pushing the right button, opening the right door, making the right realisation, ticking the right box - a shared effort, where previously there had only been Dirk, closing his eyes, making a move and hoping for the best. Todd eased Dirk's burden considerably, just as Dirk eased the burden of living for Todd, turning a once bland life into a sea of vibrant colours - even if some of those colours were terrifying. 

This supernatural dynamic was the very thing that made the duo so effective - and ineffective all at once. 

Todd sighed deeply as he let the countdown tick by, feeling for the millionth time like a helpless moth caught in fate's unrelenting web. He looked away from the screen and walked towards the socket, heavy feet dragging underneath him (and that wasn't just because of the 3 inch thick specially insulated shoes he was wearing to traverse the electrified mass of cables and cogs beneath him) 

He tried to block out the obnoxious beeping of the AI's countdown, which proved difficult as it was becoming louder, a desperate plea from a machine who thought it had all humans figured out. Not these humans. If Dirk and Todd couldn't figure themselves out, a man made machine, no matter how intelligent, had no real hope in hell. 

He looked at the socket, knowing this computer had nothing else to throw at him. It had exhausted all its resources, in this compartment at least. Dirk had the map. Maybe he could use it to avoid whatever death trap this nightmare robot had formulated - if it had even got that far.    

Todd thought about the last time he and Dirk had fucked - tried to calm his anxiety with memories of Dirk's hungry gaze and greedy caresses, but this only served to exacerbate the problem considering the fate of said man was still unknown. It was a reflex from the days before he could manage - with arguable efficiency - his pararibulitis. Over painstaking time, he learned to anticipate situations that could potentially bring on an attack, so he tried to think calming thoughts to stave them off: jamming with Amanda, overlooking a beautiful vista at sunset, watching TV with his new friends - then, as his wholly inconvenient crush on Dirk deepened, Dirk's eyes, Dirk's smile, the way Dirk stuck his tongue out just a little when he was concentrating really hard on something, Dirk's laugh, Dirk's bouncy walk, Dirk's hands, Dirk's hugs, how the moles that trailed from Dirk's neck to his cheek reminded Todd of a star constellation - 

Even if it never worked, it was all he had. Before he and Amanda knew what it actually was they were dealing with. 

Todd, not one for saccharine admissions, never told Dirk he thought of him during those moments, but in the various life or death situations they faced, he wanted to tell Dirk everything and fill the gaping chasm of the unsaid with every shape and size of feeling he had for him. Just for a second. 

The countdown the AI provided had passed. If Dirk was going to die it would have happened already. Todd hadn't had a full attack for almost 2 years. If he had one now, it would most likely be a sign. His skin stayed cool and he remained out of pain, save the tightness in his chest. He took this as fresh hope, and waited. The screen flashed manically in his peripheral vision, and he ignored it, steadfast. He wasn't sure he'd be able to stick to the rule if it showed Dirk dying. There was still that sliver of doubt, a hairline possibility that the supposedly assured theory behind their entwined story was still just that - a theory, and that the string of corresponding events and mental states they'd shared were just a bunch of insane coincidences, and that one could indeed die without the other. Even if the theory  _were_ true and one of them died, that could be the very thing to break the chain. Anything was possible. 

_The screen went blank and the room went dark with a down winding whir. Todd took a deep breath and pushed in the switch with both hands. He felt a phantom hand on his, pushing with him, and he knew Dirk was still alive. He flipped the switch. Dirk was probably making his escape at the same moment. Todd had followed the rule and the universe let them live - for now. The 5 second countdown passed. The room stayed dark and the screen stayed blank. The doors would be open now so they could find each other before going to the hospital to check on Lev. See if it worked. See if the computer let him go. See if the computer let his Father go. See if they'd saved the day once again._

Neither Dirk or Todd had ever tried to 'leave their path' - even in rare moments of despair - like when Todd was so white hot with rage that he wanted to throttle Dirk until his big blue eyes popped right out of his stupid head, or when Dirk let himself become consumed with fear and guilt over Todd risking his life so much that he just wanted to push him away, to give him the chance to have something that mildly resembled a normal life. No matter what, they kept on it. 

Todd knew his duty, kinda. He understood - for the most part - what he had to do. Plus, all in all, he didn't _want_ to leave the path. He chose his moves, and staying with Dirk was his choice. Always had been. Todd kept telling himself that, and it made him feel in control. He told himself that if the circumstances were different and he and Dirk had just been two normal, sane dudes who'd met in a boring, eventless world, they'd still have fallen for each other. (Consequently, the encounters with several of their inter-dimentional counterparts did nothing to debunk this speculation.)

Then of course, when they found themselves alone in their apartment, case solved, clients safe and fee incoming, their shared satisfaction and relief lead them inevitably to the bedroom, where their connection reached its best peak, no longer remaining figurative and intangible. They'd lose themselves in each other completely, intense pleasure rebalancing the scale, all pain and hardship forgotten. Their work, save the somewhat inconsistent payment and the equally inconsistent gratitude of the people - or 'beings' - who hired them, went largely uncredited. The way they made each other feel in those precious stolen pockets of time when they became a blur of blissful heat, touch, taste and…something - it was enough for them. It made it all worth it. Their connection was the compensation, even if the universe hadn't meant it to be.

In one particular moment of quiet reflection and seldom experienced calm - both basking in the post sex afterglow, sweat slowly drying on their naked bodies as they hold each other, intimately conversing in hushed tones and drifting into sleep - Dirk tentatively tried to bring said connection into context. This 'unsolved case' wasn't nearly as pressing as the others, but it had become just as important to Dirk as any of the official not Todd related cases. 

"Do you think that, maybe we are the way we are because we met in a time loop? Like, we're meeting over and over again, somewhere in the vastness of it all - and that loop forms some kind've...link between us?"

"Don't think about it." Todd mumbled, head on Dirk's chest, the sound of his heartbeat a regular lullaby for him. Dirk continued to idly stroke the length of Todd's spine. 

 "I know you don't like talking about it-"

"- I never said that."

"- well, I can  _sense_ that you don't like talking about it, but don't you think it's just a little bit fascinating?"

"Hmm - not to mention confusing as hell and a conversation for another ti-"

"- It could still be the Electric Ghost Rhino thing."

Another one of Dirk's half baked theories - that when they'd formed a human chain to unlock the Rhino door in the Patrick Spring killy maze the soul of Pepe had somehow melded their own two souls together, just a little bit, so part of Dirk's soul was inside Todd and vice versa. Dirk tried to remain as clinical and matter of fact as possible when discussing that particular theory, but it still teetered dangerously on the 'corny as hell romantic' precipice they both actively skirted around. 

If Todd had any inclination to join the discussion he'd have said that he thought their paths had become linked before that - before they even met (both times) - and that he'd seen enough of the inner workings of the universe (as in, a billionth of a fraction, but still) to guess that there was something more to it. What that 'something more' was, he couldn't say - nor did it really matter. Some things could remain a mystery. But try telling Dirk that. 

Dirk continued to ramble, the vibrations of his voice in his chest rumbling against Todd's ear. When Todd realised that - much like the same time loop they'd met in, the spitballing had fallen into that familiar 'going nowhere fast' circle, he shifted onto his elbow with a sigh and lightly touched his finger tips to Dirk's cheek. The soft skin moved underneath them, Dirk's eyes bright and tired all at once, his brow furrowed in confusion as he stared into the abyss of the unknown in his no doubt brilliant but still breakable mind. Todd turned his head to face him and stilled his lips with a kiss, figuring sleep could wait in favour of distracting Dirk from potential insanity with the last, lazy round of the night. 

Sure enough, the next case would arrive and they would both have to put their feelings in the 'save for later' box, approaching the new challenge with clear heads and ready hearts: two unsung heroes helping their fellow children of the universe at any cost. 

\- and, at some point down the line, when one of them would inevitably break the rule, the box not shut tight enough - not nearly enough (never, ever enough) they'd just have to accept the chaos it would cause. Deal with it then. Let the universe take its best shot. 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Had to mention Sam/Dirk's face and neck moles as I'm obsessed with them. Obviously.


End file.
